The nice people of Rupert’s world sat down with Google head man – Eric Schmidt. The Wall Street Journal team peppered Eric with lots of interesting questions. Some of his answers would make the usual PRHHM (Public Relations hacks handlers and minders) squirm.
In the Googlesphere it has become clear that all information should be held sacred as long as Google has a copy and is in charge of what gets shown and not shown. As Schmidt noted in the Techonomy conference on August 4, 2010 , all information should be subject to “much greater transparency and no anonymity.” … because he assumes that (Google) technology is ultimately good (as opposed to evil). I think that makes me very nervous. And thank you, I vote for my Government which I think is called a democracy. Going back to the WSJ article, Schmidt continues – “Most people….. They want Google to tell them what they should be doing next.”
In general I believe that personalization is part of the mix. My view is that ‘context’ is better term than ‘personalization’. I don’t think that everything needs to be/should be uniquely or personalized. That is not how we are in our work and personal lives. To assume that this is the case is blatantly arrogant in my view. What happens if you get this wrong? And yes people who should know better do get these sort of things wrong – frequently. Just look at credit reports. But Google doesn’t seem to want to think about that because…. Mr. Schmidt is a believer in targeted advertising because, simply, he’s a believer in targeted everything: “The power of individual targeting—the technology will be so good it will be very hard for people to watch or consume something that has not in some sense been tailored for them.” ….This is a direct quote from the WSJ. Too bad that Big Brother Google will be the arbiter or this and thence directly or indirectly control and influence our tastes.